Aristophanes, The Knights 498–623a: Parabasis: the Chorus speaks for the poet, then praises Poseidon, Athena and the Knights

Good-bye and good speed: may your daring succeed, And Zeus of the Agora help you in need. May you conquer in fight, and return to our sight A Victor triumphant with garlands bedight. But ye to our anapaests listen the while, And give us the heed that is due, Ye wits, who the Muse of each pattern and style Yourselves have attempted to woo.

If one of the old-fashioned Comedy-bards had our services sought to impress, And make us before the spectators appear, to deliver the public address, He would not have easily gained us; but now, with pleasure we grant the request Of a poet who ventures the truth to declare, and detests what we also detest, And against the Tornado and Whirlwind, alone, with noble devotion advances. But as for the question that puzzles you most, so that many inquire how it chances That he never a Chorus had asked for himself, or attempted in person to vie, On this we’re commissioned his views to explain, and this is the Poet’s reply; That ’twas not from folly he lingered so long, but discerning by shrewd observation That Comedy-Chorus-instruction is quite the most difficult thing in creation. For out of the many who courted the Muse she has granted her favours to few, While e’en as the plants that abide but a year, so shifting and changeful are you; And the Poets who flourished before him, he saw, ye were wont in their age to betray. Observing the treatment which Magnes received when his hair was besprinkled with grey,

Than whom there was none more trophies had won in the fields of dramatic display. All voices he uttered, all forms he assumed, the Lydian, the fig-piercing Fly, The Harp with its strings, the Bird with its wings, the Frog with its yellow-green dye. Yet all was too little; he failed in the end, when the freshness of youth was gone by, And at last in his age he was hissed from the stage when lost was his talent for jeering. Then he thought of Cratinus who flowed through the plains ’mid a tumult of plaudits and cheering; And sweeping on all that obstructed his course, with a swirl from their stations he tore them, Oaks, rivals, and planes; and away on his flood uprooted and prostrate he bore them. And never a song at a banquet was sung but Doro fig-sandaled and true, Or Framers of terse and artistical verse, such a popular poet he grew. Yet now that he drivels and dotes in the streets, and Time of his ambers has reft him, And his framework is gaping asunder with age, and his strings and his music have left him, No pity ye show; no assistance bestow; but allow him to wander about Like Connas, with coronal withered and sere, and ready to perish with drought;

Who ought for his former achievements to drink in the Hall, nor be laid on the shelf, But to sit in the Theatre shining and bright, beside Dionysus himself. And then he remembered the stormy rebuffs which Crates endured in his day, Who a little repast at a little expense would provide you, then send you away; Who the daintiest little devices would cook from the driest of mouths for you all; Yet he, and he only held out to the end, now standing, now getting a fall. So in fear of these dangers he lingered; besides, a sailor, he thought, should abide And tug at the oar for a season, before he attempted the vessel to guide; And next should be stationed awhile at the prow, the winds and the weather to scan; And then be the Pilot, himself for himself. So seeing our Poet began In a mood so discreet, nor with vulgar conceit rushed headlong before you at first, Loud surges of praise to his honour upraise; salute him, all hands, with a burst

Dread Poseidon, the Horseman’s King, Thou who lovest the brazen clash, Clash and neighing of warlike steeds; Pleased to watch where the trireme speeds Purple-beaked, to the oar’s long swing, Winning glory (and pay); but chief Where bright youths in their chariots flash Racing (coming perchance to grief); Cronus’s son, Throned on Geraestus and Sunium bold, Swaying thy dolphins with trident of gold, Come, O come, at the call of us; Dearest to Phormio thou, Yea and dearest to all of us, Dearest to all of us now. Let us praise our mighty fathers, men who ne’er would quake or quail, Worthy of their native country, worthy of Athene’s veil; Men who with our fleets and armies everywhere the victory won, And adorned our ancient city by achievements nobly done. Never stayed they then to reckon what the numbers of the foe, At the instant that they saw him, all their thought was At him go!

If they e’er in desperate struggling on their shoulder chanced to fall, Quick they wiped away the dust-mark, swore they ne’er were thrown at all, Closed again in deadly grapple. None of all our generals brave Then had stooped a public banquet from Cleaenetus to crave. Now unless ye grant them banquets, grant precedence as their right, They will fight no more, they tell you. Our ambition is to fight Freely for our Gods and country, as our fathers fought before, No reward or pay receiving; asking this and nothing more, When returning Peace shall set us free from all our warlike toil, Grudge us not our flowing ringlets, grudge us not our baths and oil. Holy Pallas, our guardian Queen, Ruling over the holiest land, Land poetic, renowned, and strong, First in battle and first in song, Land whose equal never was seen, Come to prosper our Choral band! Bring thou with thee the Maiden bright, Her who greets us in every fight, Victory! She in the choir-competition abides with us, Always against our antagonists sides with us.

Come, great Goddess, appear to us, Now, if ever, we pray, Bring thou victory dear to us, Crown thine Horsemen to-day. What we witnessed with our horses we desire to eulogize. Worthy they of praise and honour! many a deed of high emprize, Many a raid and battle-onset they with us have jointly shared. Yet their feats ashore surprise not, with their feats afloat compared, When they bought them cans and garlic, bought them strings of onions too, Leapt at once aboard the transports, all with manful hearts and true, Took their seats upon the benches, dipped their oar-blades in the sea, Pulled like any human beings, neighing out their Hippapae Pull my hearties, pull your strongest, don’t be shirking, Sigma-brand, Then they leapt ashore at Corinth, and the youngest of the band Hollowed with their hoofs their couches or for bedding searched about. And they fed on crabs, for clover, if they met one crawling out, Or detected any lurking in the Ocean’s deepest bed, Till at length a crab of Corinth, so Theorus tells us, said:

CHORUS Hard it is, my Lord Poseidon, if the Knights we cannot flee Even in the depths of Ocean, anywhere by land or sea. [Enter the SAUSAGE-SELLER.]

CHORUS Dearest of men, my lustiest, trustiest friend, Good lack! how anxious has your absence made us! But now that safe and sound you are come again, Say what has happened, and how went the fight.

SAUSAGE-SELLER How else but thus? The Council-victor I.

CHORUS Now may we, joyous, raise the song of sacred praise. Fair the words you speak, but fairer Are the deeds you do. Far I’d go, This I know, But to hear them through. Now then tell us all the story, All that, where you went, befell; Fearless be, Sure that we All delight in all you tell.